


We Study Our Story Arcs

by Waistcoat35



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Astronomer Javert, Cuddling & Snuggling, Fluff, I know it won't seem like it at first but there is gonna be SO MUCH FLUFF nearer the end, Insecure Javert, Javert needs a hug, M/M, Mild Language, Multiple Lifetimes, Reincarnation AU, Reunion, So does Jean, Stars, They'll get one, eventually, it's fine
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-04
Updated: 2018-02-04
Packaged: 2019-03-13 16:02:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13574007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Waistcoat35/pseuds/Waistcoat35
Summary: Or, four times they lost each other and one time they didn't.





	We Study Our Story Arcs

**Author's Note:**

> This is strongly inspired by and titled after Bad Blood, by Sleeping At Last. I hope you guys like it - it began as a short-ass drabble and then sort of... expanded? Rapidly??
> 
> (P.S If you want to listen to the reading playlist while you read, the link to it is in the notes at the end.)

** _1._ **

France is the first time – the first ever. Or perhaps it is actually the latest of many, and they have forgotten their failed beginnings in favour of this one. This is the one where there is a realisation – perhaps fate or the Lord has been thrusting them together for decades, like two pieces of flint, and it is just now that their collision has produced a spark.

However, the surroundings and circumstances of 19th century France are insufficient kindling, dampened by desperation and hatred and the wrong kind of want. And so the spark is barely there before it dims; one dies from a sickness of the mind, the other from that of the heart.

 

** _2._ **

The next time, they barely even meet – perhaps they had died too far apart. That time is a mere brush of hands on a crowded street, and they both carry on and forget and, later, remember again. The last thing they both see on their deathbeds, years later, is the flashing face of the other, noticed for a brief moment in youth and gone as quickly as a dying star.

 

** _3._ **

The next time, they are perhaps at their youngest. They meet in a trench in a tattered world, and it is a setting still terribly familiar to them. They clash, and argue, and the fondness is veiled beneath disdain, but it is most certainly there. It is _there_ , and that is what matters. They do kiss, that time. Just quickly, just once, a panicked press of lips jogged by pained sobs and panicky breaths, the elder kneeling over to avoid the younger’s injured knee, before the convict, ever-loving and ever-kind, shields his friend from a blast. And it is then that the inspector first truly knows what it is to love someone, and then lose them. The convict’s heart has killed him again, even so. (Perhaps they should lose their past titles. War and hell do not discriminate, after all, and a description of someone’s former role does no good there. They are all only soldiers, after all.)

 

** _4._ **

That war takes them both in the end, and yet they are dropped into another one the fourth time. They are both pilots, the same group under the same sky. Flying together, it is the closest they have ever come to the stars. After the war is over, they hope it may actually end up lasting. But that too is not to be. The convict becomes a navigator, but the inspector can never let go of his sky. The now-navigator tries to guide his flight out of a storm, but the devil has once again intervened in the Lord’s plan and formed a patch of sea that they become ensnared in. The navigator begs and pleads and orders, but to no avail. All he hears are the last words of his pilot, then metal hitting water like the chop of the guillotine, then static. Now they have both loved and lost, and he mourns for the rest of his life.

 

** _5._ **

The last time, they make it. A convict becomes a museum curator, an inspector becomes an astronomer. When he gives talks at the museum the curator is always there, always listening, standing at the back as if expecting to be shooed away. He watches with a blooming fondness that the younger man always links to rain and mist and a muddy network of tunnels embedded in the ground, the fondness the source from which he draws his only warmth.

 

Once, the astronomer talks about the Pleiades, about Merope, who hides her face from her sisters, shamed for loving someone she is forbidden to love. The astronomer and the curator both think, somewhat wryly, that they can relate to her more than is necessarily comfortable. When the talk is over, the room all but empty, the younger packs up his notes and turns, hearing a huff of breath. The other is coming towards him slowly, be it so as not to spook him or because he is scared himself. There is something soothing and gentle and pleading in his eyes, as though he has just found something he was looking for and had long missed. The warmth surges back through the astronomer once again, and ever so shyly, he ventures forward.

Something clicks in their eyes at the same time, and despite the speed at which they remember, despite how long they have both been waiting, Valjean is still remarkably gentle when he leans down and their lips meet. Javert practically burrows into the warmth of him, breaking off more than once to nuzzle into the crook between Jean’s neck and shoulder. There are arms around him, and his arms are around Jean, who smells like tea and worn papers and damp autumn mist. Those smells have followed Javert through lifetimes, and if anybody asks he will say that they are now his favourites.

Javert, damn him, is now rambling into Jean’s shoulder.

“I don’t think I mentioned Orion, did I?”

Jean chuckles, and though Javert can’t see his face he knows he’ll be wearing that _expression_ , the one that’s so affectionate and amused and loving that it almost makes him want to cry happy tears because it’s _too much_. “What about Orion?”

“Orion and the Pleiades. The sisters, they were turned into stars so that he couldn’t catch them. He’ll chase them, he’ll always chase them – but he’ll never catch them. He can’t ever catch up to them, because they’re unreachable.” Damn it all, why is he rambling? He always does this, they always do _something_ , in each lifetime, and this is probably the part where it goes wrong, because he’s opened his goddamn _mouth_ and _spoken_. Without realising it, Javert has tensed, waiting for some sort of rebuke, to be told that he’s ridiculous. To be told that those years, they haven’t meant anything solid. That things have changed, and he really is Orion. Always chasing, never catching up.

But instead, he gets a soft chuckle that curls sweetly in his belly, a not-quite-as-soft squeeze as Jean rubs his shoulders and rests his head on Javert’s. “You’re thinking far too hard, you know. You’re all tense.” He gulps down the slight lump in his throat, knowing Valjean can feel the motion. “It’s alright,” the elder is murmuring soothingly, “it’s alright. I’m not going anywhere, I’ve got you.”

Five lifetimes and Javert still wonders how he does that – just _knows_ that something is wrong, knows what it is, knows how to make it better. When he has calmed, Valjean pulls back slightly, looking pleased.

“There, now – you see? Everything’s alright.” He nods softly, attempts a weak smile and somehow surprises even himself when he actually manages. Valjean’s eyes are glowing, almost, with that delightful warmth. “You know, I believe you were slightly erroneous in your comparison to Orion and his Pleiades. You’re far better than him, really – for one thing, you’ve actually managed to catch up to me. I was rather hoping you would.”

He’s gently tugging Javert’s hand now, walking with their shoulders pressed together towards his office. Once inside, he slides a file out of a cabinet, doing so one-handed so that he does not have to let Javert go. He should not, Javert thinks, be as grateful for this as he is. Jean opens the file up and spreads the contents on his desk – birth and death records, small newspaper articles from 1830s France, several grainy black-and-white photographs from their time at war.

“I’ve been waiting a long time for you to find me. I keep them here, every time they cross my desk. I shouldn’t, really, but then again, who else deserves to see our history laid bare more so than us two?” They know the answer to that; nobody, nobody including God himself. Such a thing may be selfish, according to Jean, because He may be the one to thank for their history in the first place, but after all the years and all the searching, they are allowed to be selfish once in a while. There is nothing but the warmth, and as Valjean too tires and sags and eventually crumbles, they hold each other up, snuggled into one another in the office as the night air cools and the stars set in

Perhaps those stars have finally been aligned the right way; it only took a _few_ misjudged attempts.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you again for all of your wonderful kudos and feedback - my favourite thing about writing )or one of them, at least!) is making people happy with something I made. Therefore I sincerely hope you enjoyed this.
> 
> Reading Playlist:  
> https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL_0MOReu2_XpVcKOjfRJDJuHYq-RntrAy  
> Bad Blood - Sleeping At Last  
> After The War - Stars  
> Dance Dance - Fall Out Boy  
> Never Enough - The Greatest Showman  
> Tightrope - The Greatest Showman  
> Eet - Regina Spektor  
> Us - Regina Spektor  
> Two Birds - Regina Spektor  
> Fools - Lauren Aquilina  
> Distance - Christina Perri  
> Light - Sleeping At Last  
> Smile - Mikky Ekko  
> Willow - Jasmine Thompson  
> Start of Time - Gabrielle Aplin  
> North - Sleeping At Last


End file.
